picture. u.s. oil production near a 15-year high. and you're hearing this new buzz word. is the u.s. becoming the new saudi america? new details in the murder/suicide involving kansas city chiefs player jovan belcher. what the 911 tapes reveal about the final moments of this slain girlfriend. >> a lot to talk about this morning over our next two hours. we will be talking with stephanie cutter, the former companisy campaign manager of president obama's re-election campaign. howard kurtz the host of "cnn's reliable sources" lauren ashburn, republican from texas, congressman jeb hensarling with us, randy weingarten, president of the american federation of teachers. all guests this morning. wednesday, december 5th, and "starting point" begins right now.

our "starting point" this morning, president obama putting his foot down. he says no tax hikes for the wealthy, no deal. america hits that fiscal cliff in 27 days and that means tax hikes and deep spending cuts if the democrats and the republicans can't come together in some kind of a deal and with just ten days remaining until congress is scheduled to go home for the holidays, the clock ticking. here's what he told bloomberg news. listen. >> we're going to have to see the rates on the top 2% go up and we're not going to be able it to get a deal without it. >> we start this morning with white house correspondent dan lothian, he's in washington, d.c. okay. so who's got the ball in their court at this point then, dan? >> well, you know, i think the house gop, they have presented their counteroffer which white house spokesman jay carney is referring to as, quote, magic beans and fairy dust. we expect that house republicans will keep putting pressure on the white house to engage, push for more details on what the white house will accept when it comes to additional entitlement

cuts. but i think what's unclear is what kind of negotiating is going on behind the scenes. the white house saying that conversations continue, but house gop aides telling me that there are no conversations as of late yesterday, no emalts being exchanged, no phone calls. so it's unclear how they can move the ball forward, if there are no real conversations taking place. there's also another problem for republicans. they're not on the same page. you have that proposal put forward by speaker john boehner that calls for $800 billion in new tax revenue, but some conservatives think that republicans are giving up too much. take a listen. >> republicans should not be conceding that the federal government needs more money, negotiating with ourselves and treating the president's proposal like it's serious. >> look, i support the speaker and we're actually not very far apart on anything. you know at the end of the day, he has to negotiate a deal. if there is an area we do agree with the president on, that is

98% of the american people getting about 80% of this tax cut shouldn't have their taxes raised. my suggestion was let's take the one area we agree and take it off the table. >> now later this morning, president obama will be speaking and taking questions at the business round table meeting, a white house official saying that the president will make the case that middle-class americans need certainty that their taxes will not go up at the end of the year. he will also make the case that this fiscal cliff will have a negative impact on the overall economy and he will push these business leaders to support his approach. soledad? >> dan lothian, in washington, d.c., for us, thank you. just a few minutes we'll be chatting with stephanie cutter, the woman who helped manage president obama's re-election campaign. we'll talk more about the fiscal cliff. first a look at other stories that are making news today. zoraida has that for us. >> good morning to you. the death toll in the philippines is rising this morning. typhoon bopha moving toward beach resorts in the northern part of the country and right now it is packing winds over 90

miles an hour. that storm has already caused massive flooding and landslides in the southern philippines. dozens of buildings have been destroyed and the death toll stands at 133 with hundreds more still missing. meantime in rain soaked seattle there are concerns about more mudslides. meteorologist karen maginnis joins us live from atlanta with the latest. they cannot get a break. >> they really can't, and for some folks, this is not coming as good news because it looks like that pineapple express, that moisture coming from deep within the pacific, that's going to be shut off, but we've still got the moisture coming in from the gulf of alaska and that's going to lower the snow levels across the cascades and the olympics down to around 2,000 feet or so. it has been hovering around 3,000 or 4,000 feet. we've got additional snowfall here but also the rain moves in. take a look at video that we have from our cnn affiliate, komo, and a house has been steadily sliding down a hill.

this is in the vicinity of everette, washington, and they say that this has been going on for quite some time. so every time it rains, not just this one house, but a number of homes in this particular neighborhood, they say every time it rains it just kind of undermines the footings on the homes there and they tend to slip down even more. we've seen this over the past month or so. so scozoraida, they are not loog forward to the additional rainfall and the much colder air that is in store. they saw some wind gusts, by the way, with these storms up to 150 miles an hour. >> wow. karen maginnis live for us in atlanta, thank you very much for that. emotional 911 calls in the alleged murder/suicide involving kansas city chiefs player jovan belcher. the mother of the chiefs' player is heard pleading with dispatchers and her son's girlfriend kasandra perkins who had just been shot. listen. >> she is still breathing but barely. please hurry. i don't know how many times he

shot her. they were arguing. >> okay. . so she's been shot? >> yes. >> right now is she awake? >> cassandra stay with me. the ambulance is on the way. do you hear me? cassandra! stay with me. >> oh, my goodness. that's difficult to listen to. police say after shooting his girlfriend, belcher drove to arrowhead stadium where he killed himself at the chiefs' practice fa tilsey after thanking his coach and general manager for all they had done for himp. two rising republican stars are trying to rebrand themselves and their party. florida senator marco rubio and congressman paul ryan of wisconsin appearing together last night at the jack kemp foundation awards dinner washington. listen to mitt romney's former running mate softening the rhetoric. >> both parties tend to divide americans into our voters and their voters. let's be really clear. republicans must steer far clear of that track. we must speaks to the

aspirations and the anxieties of every american. >> senator rubio weighing in on the fiscal cliff debate and the idea of raising tax rates for the wealthy saying we need to make poor people richer, not rich people poorer. soledad. >> that's the kind of thinking that will get you votes, right? >> all right. thanks, zoraida. >> new york city police could be close to charging a suspect in that fatal subway push. they say a man is now being questioned and has implicated himself in this case. a front page "new york post" photo has become the source of a lot of controversy. it shows the victim desperately trying to climb up from the tracks as the train approaches. this morning we're hearing that the photographer has said some things in his own defense. cnn's mary snow has more on this report. >> [ bleep ] alone. take your [ bleep ] over there. >> reporter: why exactly these men were fighting is unclear. but moments after this video obtained by the new york police was record 58-year-old ki-suck

han whose face is obscured, was pushed on to the tracks, police say, by the man yelling at him. subway barreling through the station killed han with horrified onlookers unable to save him. >> i know they kept arguing with each other. i see people trying to flag the train down before the train gets to him. >> reporter: the fight happened around 12:30 in the afternoon on this platform that's only about ten feet wide. a doctor who was on the platform says that the victim was trying to protect people that he didn't know, and she says that many people tried to help him by alerting subway personnel. the victim was struck and she says she performed three to four minutes of chest compressions on him, but it was too late. one eyewitness describes the train coming to an abrupt stop three quarters into the station. >> people were just standing in fear and shock not knowing what's really going on. some people started running out of the platform, you know, other people just stood there. really didn't know what was going on. >> reporter: the suspect

meantime was able to slip out of the station into times square and police canvassed the area with his image placed on wanted posters in the streets. but it was another image in the cruel killing that has sparked an uproar. this is one of several photographs published by "the new york post" of han facing the train seconds before his death. the "post" quotes the photographer saying he tried to warn the train operator by running towards him firing off his camera flash. on-line there were public comments of disgust. wow. enough time to take a few pictures. why didn't the person help? what an age we live in when getting the picture is more important. i am appalled. >> now we did reach out to the "post" and photographer and both declined our requests for comment. should point out this is the cover of "the new york post" today saying my snap decision and the photographer talks about had is decision because there's been so much criticism. he's claiming he was too far away to be of any help. >> well, in addition to sort of

his story, and he says he couldn't get there in time and he was trying to warn anyway, the post made the decision to run the photo. the caption that said "doomed" which was just honestly -- tweeting about this yesterday. >> the man is about to die is what it said. >> brutal. >> and then, of course, afterwards, when he was struck by the train, people continued to snap pictures. >> i can't tell you, there was so much disgust expressed yesterday watching -- just seeing that photo of that helpless man and people questioning why didn't anybody try to help him? and it really just struck such a nerve. >> does anybody know how much time was between when we see him with no train in the background and he's on the tracks because there's a shot of him sitting -- sort of in that well of the tracks and between -- when the train actually came? is it 15 seconds? is it three minutes? i know there's a window when the trains come through. >> we don't know how long he was there. and, you know, there was one doctor, i mentioned, who was on

the platform and she said in a statement that she said that many people tried to help, they tried to warn the subway personnel. but we don't know how long that was. >> mary snow -- >> that photographer actually in the "new york post" says that it was 22 seconds from his perspective. i don't know if that's something he kept through his shutter he was able to tell the amount of time he says it was 22 seconds, no way he could run that quickly and assist. >> mary snow, amazing piece. thank you for that report. in about 30 minutes we'll be talking to media critic howard kurtz, the host of "cnn's reliable sources" and lauren yashburn from "the daily beast" to talk about the responsibilities and who advocated what in this case. >> up next on "starting point," the president will not accept a deal on the fiscal cliff if it doesn't include raising taxes on the wealthiest americans. is there wiggle room for compromise. former deputy campaign manager

stephanie cutter up next. u.s. oil production at its highest level in almost two decades. people on wall street say we could be a new saudi arabia. we'll chat with christine romans about that coming up next. [ male announcer ] introducing... a new way to save on your prescriptions. it's the aarp medicarerx saver plus plan from unitedhealthcare. with this plan, you can get copays as low as a dollar through a preferred network pharmacy like walgreens -- where you'll find 8,000 convenient locations. best of all, this plan has the lowest part d premium

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but with three kids, being home more really helped. man: so we went to fidelity. we talked about where we were and what we could do. we changed our plan and did something about our economy. now we know where to go for help if things change again. call or come in today to take control of your personal economy. get free one-on-one help from america's retirement leader. welcome back to "starting point." i'm christine romans. minding your business, u.s. oil production reaching its highest level in nearly 15 years. this is according to a new report from the energy information administration. daily production, daily output, averaged almost 6.5 million barrels per day in september, the highest level of oil output

in the u.s. since 1998. eia says the increase is mostly due to the extraction process known as fracking, new technology to get oil in every nook and cranny. some coined a phrase saudi america for america's projected energy boom over the next decade. a report from last month from the international energy watchdog says the u.s. could unseat saudi arabia as the world's top oil producer by the year 2020. quick market check this morning, u.s. stock futures are up, fiscal cliff uncertainty could continue to weigh on stocks until it's resolved. we're getting a lot of economic news this week with the jobs report on friday. so i expect to see hurricane sandy was at play in there. >> figuring into that report. looking forward to that. first it was republicans throwing the president's fiscal cliff plan right back at him. now it's the president's turn. he rejected an offer that included no raise in tax rates for the top 2% of americans, seemed to indicate a little

wiggle room on his insistence the taxes go up for the wealthy from 35% to 39.6%. here's what he told bloomberg tv. >> do they have to go up to 39.6% now? >> let me sort of describe the process here for you, juliana. let's let those go up and then let's set up a process with a time certain at the end of 2013 or the fall of 2013 where we work on tax reform, look at what loopholes and deductions both democrats and republicans are willing to close and it's possible that we may be able to lower rates by broadening the base at that point. >> want to get to stephanie cutter former deputy campaign manager for obama 2012. stephanie, nice to have you with us this morning. appreciate your time as always. you're the -- >> thanks for having me. >> that was your old job. the former campaign manager. feels like the campaign is not over. the president has been on the road selling, you know, campaigning on this topic. on monday he didn't have any meetings about the fiscal cliff.

on tuesday he was talking to the governors of six states. today, wednesday, he'll be addressing the business roundtable. there are some folks who have said why is he having all these meetings and not just sitting down with john boehner. the two need to get in a room and work this out. why not that? >> well, there are plenty of conversations going on, but soledad, we've been in this place before. unless republicans are willing to come to the table wait real proposal, not what they came to the table with this week, then those discussions aren't going to bear a lot of fruit. >> so let me stop you there -- >> the american people are watching this debate. >> and we are. all of us are watching this debate. what do you mean by real proposal? we know the republicans said that they laughed the president's version 1.0 out of the room, they came forward with the proposal. what's not real about their proposal? >> the president's 1.0 proposal was actually what we discussed for more than a year and a half on the campaign trail, $4 trillion of balanced deficit reduction. weight not a real proposal what

is john boehner sent to the white house which actually lowered rates for those at the top but asked the middle class to bear the entire burden of deficit reduction. that's not what the american people voted for. i mean if you look at even cnn's exit polls all over this country, upwards of 60, 65% of people voted for balanced deficit reduction, which means asking those at the top to pay their fair share. more people voted for that, the idea of that, then they voted for the president. so we need to look to the american people and look what they want on how to reduce the deficit. we have to do it in a balanced way and fair way. >> but if you look at polling and i know you don't always just go on polling, right, but polling is also -- you ask people what should be cut, 79% say don't cut medicare at all and i think that lots of things, democrats and republicans have said, that is on the table too. you don't always necessarily follow the polls when you listen to the president who was on bloomberg yesterday, here's what he said about meeting with speaker boehner. let's play that.

>> speaker boehner was here at the white house last night for a christmas party. the two of you didn't even speak. what's it going to take to get the two of you in a room to hash this out? >> well, speaker boehner and i speak frequently and, you know, i think the issue -- >> when will the two of you sit down in a room? >> you know, i don't think that the issue right now has do with sitting in a room. >> so, essentially stephanie, is the scenario this, the tax cuts will expire so the tax cuts -- the taxes are going to go up on everybody, right? the fiscal cliff, you go over the cliff, the taxes go up for every single person. is the plan then if you do a deal for taxes on the middle class, then de facto the taxes go up on the wealthy and sort of have a win/win for the democrats? is that the scenario we're looking at now? >> well, the scenario is that we still have time to put a deal together. the president has a detailed proposal on the table. republicans need to decide where they want to move.

john boehner needs to decide how he will get his caucus together. they're becoming increasingly isolated in their position. hopefully we can have a deal which protects the middle class. there is a piece of legislation sitting in the house today that would prevent taxes from going up on 98% of the american people. 97% of small businesses. they should go ahead and move that. and then we can have a broader discussion of how we achieve larger deficit reduction and avoid the fiscal cliff. but there's plenty of room and plenty of time for compromise. the president's position is clear. we're not going to do anything that hurts the middle class. we are going to protect those tax cuts for the middle class and for deficit reduction it needs to be fair and it needs to be balanced. everybody needs to pay their share so we can invest in the things we need to grow. >> i'm not sure about the plenty of time. 27 days. >> right. we are -- out of time. every day that goes by. >> stephanie cutter this morning -- >> every day that goes by, you can see more and more support for that balanced position. i think you'll hear it today

when the president meets with the business roundtable. >> all right. we'll see about that. nice to have you as always. we appreciate your time. >> thanks for having me. >> still ahead on "starting point" for the first time in years newarks's mayor counting his pennies when it comes to the grocery list. he talks about the challenges of using food stamps in a video that's coming up next. our "starting point" team is in to talk about that and much more. you're "starting point." back in just a moment. every time. here, 2% on groceries. 3% on gas. automatically. no hoops to jump through. that's 1% back on... [ toy robot sounds ] 2% on pumpkin pie. and apple. 3% back on 4 trips to the airport. it's as easy as... -[ man ] 1... -[ woman ] 2... [ woman ] 3. [ male announcer ] the bankamericard cash rewards card. apply online or at a bank of america near you. but they haven't experienced extra strength bayer advanced aspirin. in fact, in a recent survey, 95% of people who tried it agreed

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welcome back. let's introduce your team this morning, will kaine, contributor for the blaze.com. mccabe is back with buzzfeed.com. roughing it, though, the newark mayor cory booker, talking about

this blogging about his week-long food stamp challenge, living on the groceries he can buy for roughly $30 a week. a photo he tweeted, 17 cans of beans, 7 yams, two bags of frozen vegetables, what he can eat because that's what he can afford under the food stamp program. interesting to follow limb on this. >> cory is a fascinating guy. i like him. one conversation developing out of this i don't thing is right, soledad. you're not supposed to be able to live on subsidies. not supposed to be able to live on food stamps. it's a supplement. it's not designed to be your sole source of food and income. i think some will take the wrong message. >> for a grown man of his size to have to spend $30 and that's what you get in living in newark, new jersey, in an urban environment where the food is not particularly cheap is tough. you're right, they're not paying for every meal and calorie he's ingesting but that's not much food. >> what's part of that discussion a twitter

conversation where somebody said the state shouldn't be responsible for nutrition, right? and because part of the problem here is that people who are food stamps don't have access to really healthy food. you see cory booker made his, you know, best attempt at getting healthy food, frozen vegetables, canned beans and things like that. that is part of the problem with nutrition and poverty stricken areas. >> and that amount. we have to take a short break. >> [ inaudible ]. >> still ahead -- >> have a job, son. >> you do. i'm going to check you. >> "the new york post" and its photographer taking heat over the cover photo of a man taking minutes before his death he was crushed by the train. did the paper cross the line in publishing that picture. we'll talk about that coming up. lashawn's got her christmas list. she's looking for a fijit at toys "r" us.

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night. kind of throwing me a little bit. >> sure. >> welcome back is what i was trying to say. in a couple minutes we'll be talking about the picture that was on the front page of "the new york post," absolutely horrifying picture because you can see a man that's on the train tracks and then you see the subway train about to hit him. we're going to talk to howard kurtz of cnn's "reliable source." marco rubio, congressman paul ryan of wisconsin made a joint appearance last night at the jack kemp foundation awards dinner in washington, d.c. both men you can tell by their remarks were trying hard to broaden their message and soften their tone. cnn political editor paul steinhauser is in washington, d.c., this morning. paul, nice to talk to you. we know that ryan really got clobbered during the presidential campaign when he talked about makers and takers, and now it seems like they're flipping the script on that. >> yeah.

this was ryan's first since the election and his message was different than what the republican running mate was saying during -- on the campaign trail a few months ago. you know, while ryan said he was proud of what he and mitt romney did on the campaign trail, both he and rubio seemed to be pushing back a little bit against mitt romney's controversial comments that 47% of americans are dependent on the government and feel they're victims. he and rubio laid out a vision for the party that includes helping all americans raise their economic standing. take a listen. >> both parties tend to divide americans into our voters and their voters. let's be really clear. republicans must steer far clear of that trap. we must speaks to the aspirations and anxieties of every american. >> i've heard it suggested that the problem is that the american people have changed. that too many people want things from government. but i'm still convinced that the overwhelming majority of our people, they just want what my parents had, a chance.

>> soledad, the kemp foundation named after the late running mate a hero to conservatirvatic. ryan won the award last year, rubio got it this year. both guys may be thinking about running for the 2016 nomination and both joked about it at the beginning of their speeches saying they should have lunch in iowa or new hampshire or south carolina. a lot more attention on these two as we move toward 2016. it's a long way away. >> and yet not. we're discussing it. thanks, paul. turn to zoraida sambolin, has a look at other stories making news. good morning again. >> good morning to you. with 27 days left before we come face to face with the fiscal cliff, former presidential candidate newt gingrich has some advice for his fellow republicans. let the country go over it. gingrich telling cnn's piers morgan the president is using his newfound political capital to pressure the opposition and republicans should stand their ground. >> i think he's putting the

republic republicans in a corner. they need to relax. they don't have an election until november of 2014. you want to negotiate seriously we'll sit down and talk. you don't want to negotiate seriously, we'll survive going off this cliff. no deal is better than a bad deal. i think going off this cliff is less dangerous than letting things build up for a year or two years to have a bigger cliff. >> gingrich went on to say he doesn't sense any mutual respect right now between the president and house speaker john boehner and that troubles him. a lawyer says john mcafee will request asylum in guatemala. he emerged from weeks of hiding yesterday. he disappeared from his home in belize after his neighbor was murdered. police in belize say mcafee is no the a suspect and they just want to talk to him. mcafee said he feared persecution by police so he left belize. >> i like guatemala. i think the legal system in

guatemala is superior to the legal system in belize. >> one official in belize said if mcafee is innocent, he should just talk to them and then he can move on. dash cam individual of police intuition and action. officer pull over a car for an expired plate and hear something coming from the truck. they discovered 22-year-old shawn bloomer. the gas station clerk had been kidnapped and stuffed into the trunk. the incident happened in august but this video is only now being released. two men and a woman who were in the car are charged with robbery, kidnapping and wanton endangerme endangerment. >> oh, my gosh. >> is true there. >> work at a convenience store. >> the hospital where catherine, duchess of cambridge is staying, is reviewing its procedures after admitting it fell for a prank call. two australian deejays were able to get an update on her condition. can you believe it? claiming to be the queen and prince philip. the duchess of cambridge is said

to be feeling better but she isn't out of the hospital. prince william spending hours at her bedside as she recovers from what the palace says is extreme morning sickness. their laws are not strong out there. >> how are you doing? >> that's a good impression. >> you sound just like -- >> oh, my gosh. incredible. >> a whole lot of flow. absolutely. >> this morning police say a man has implicated himself in the death of that new yorker who was pushed on to the subway tracks. video released by police. 58-year-old victim, his name is ki-suck han standing casually as the alleged suspect argues with him just moments before he pushes him on to the path of an oncoming train. onlookers tried to wave down the train operator as han tried to climb back on the platform. the train's emergency breaks did not activate in time. han was struck and killed and many are asking if more could have been done to prevent this tragedy. it turned into outrage after "the new york post" published this picture. look at this for a moment.

shows han in the seconds he was killed. the photographer who captured the image was beaten up yesterday in the media about why he didn't help and whether the post should have published this picture at all on the cover. the photographer says he wasn't close enough to help. we want to turn to howard kurtz host of cnn's "reliable sources requests and the washington pure ro chief of "news week" and lauren ashburn, editor in chief of the daily download. nice to talk to both of you. howard, start with you, the photographer is being blamed. he says it's unfair. he said this, i can't let the armchair critics bother me. they were not there. they have no idea how quickly it happened. do you think it's unfair that people have turned now on the photographer? >> if he had no way of getting there in time, then i suppose it's a little unfair. what's not unfair is to look at the decision to take this picture and publish it. look, this picture is cheap, it's sensational, it's stomach churning but it's also news. this is what tabloids do. they exploit tragedy wringing

the emotion from it and the reason we're gripped and horrified by it, it's precisely because it is news. >> you're arguing, lauren, you shouldn't publish it or almost arguing in the second part of your sentence that you should go ahead and publish it? >> no. it's insensitive, it's inappropriate, it's sickening, rubbernecking and howie, with all due respect as the dean of the media, i completely disagree. would the post have published this if it were a white woman? i mean that's just something i'm putting out there that hasn't been discussed. >> i think they would have, yes. they would have. i do. i think -- what's shocking a about that has nothing to could with the race or gender of the individual. they would have -- i mean the fact that the train is in the same shot as a human being and by extrapolation we know he's about to die, which is horrifying, that's why it's published. >> it's profit motive journalism at its worst. >> no question "the post" is trying to sell newspapers on the stands. here's my question, it this photograph is so over the pale and so horrifying and so unfit for human consumption why is it

on every website, why has cnn shown it five or six times in the last hour? >> the question -- >> yeah. >> i guess the question is, you know, could he have done more and maybe that's a completely separate question. >> i think it is a separate question. and i think that nobody, as the photographer has now said, can know what happened in those 22 seconds. and the poynter institute has said that he has an obligation to help. now by flashing those pictures i think that he has made the case that he did try to help. and in the larger picture, you see people huddled in the corner, no one is running forward to help. >> i don't know how i feel about it. on one hand it is so disturbing, yesterday, i thought if that were my father or dad and you see a picture -- people taking a picture and not help them, i would never sleep again. heartbreaking. >> it's sensationalistic. what is the public good seeing this picture? >> this is every new yorker's

nightmare. anybody who's been on a crowded platform fears being groped or mugged or pushed on to the tracks and this captured that. you know do i like looking at this? no. would i have made the decision as the editor of "the post" to publish this? no. if you're a tabloid in new york city, it's not the picture that's obscene, it's capturing that horrifying moment before death. i do still wonder why the photographer's first instinct was to take pictures. i wonder. >> nice to see you guys. thank you. >> thanks. >> still ahead on "starting point," it's a new movie getting lots of oscar buzz, but was national security compromised to make this movie? we'll take a look at how the filmmakers got all the information behind "zero dark thirty," that's coming up next. americans believe they should be in charge of their own future.

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start saving at citi.com/pricerewind. welcome back. you're "starting point." so much buzz about a film "zero

dark thirty" which tells the story of the hunt for osama bin laden. also a lot of controversy around the film even before its released later this mon. republicans are claiming they had undeserved access to classified information about bin laden. the filmmakers say their story is based on firsthand accounts. listen. >> i certainly tried to be as faithful to the research as possible and make a good movie and make a film that was timely. >> my understanding is that the hollywood people got access to cia operatives, to cia locations, that they had access to the navy s.e.a.l.s which they should not have had. i can't really go beyond that over to say the investigation has gone on an expanded. >> ahead, we're going to talk a little bit about this movie and whether or not that's the case. you know, i wonder if national security was really compromised. >> it's been a consistent conversation. not just about this movie, right? we've had it several times. is there information coming from

the administration that constantly seems to be in a positive light and does that information go beyond and risk national security issues? i think it's a legitimate debate. >> okay. fine, what is it then? like what? we keep saying it's possible, possible national security. like what? >> we've covered it extensively. >> like what? >> the kill list, we've talked about the details of the operation to kill anwar al awlaki, the cyber attack on iran, whenever it's positive we get to hear a lot about it. >> the kill list was reported during the administration of president george w. bush when you had seemore her sh, saying that came out of vice president cheney's office. >> the one that barack obama has similar to baseball cards put in front of him. >> i'm just saying -- >> you're sitting here, there are reporters out there that provide information leaked by administrations and not like this is somehow a different administration than previous ones. >> let's just remember that this movie isn't the first one to pull the veil back on the killing of osama bin laden. there was extensive coverage right after it happened. "the new yorker" had like a

20-page sitedown interview with several different administration sources. the administration didn't go straight to these filmmakers and say, let us give you the inside scoop. i doubt there are new details in this movie that haven't already emerged. >> do you want to see this movie? >> absolutely. >> yes, absolutely. >> the best buzz this movie could have gotten. >> even watching kathryn bigelow, you know she says controversy always very, very good for your movie. >> i still remember the night it happened. i saw the real thing. >> earlier when barbara starr was talking about this, she had the package in the interview, the navy s.e.a.l. was pressured into giving up the information. i never understood that why the navy s.e.a.l.s would feel pressure. >> still ahead on "starting point," constantly surrounded by data. a new book proposes we could study that data and find patterns in it and change lives. the highest paid actor on tv is tackling one of the most innovative men of our time. can ashton kutcher live up to

the steve jobs' legacy? you're watching "starting point." we're back in just a moment. whem another company to us, we even reward you for the time you spent there. genius. yeah, genius. you guys must have your own loyalty program, right? well, we have something. show her, tom. huh? you should see november! oh, yeah? point," constantly surrounded by point." sse. call or click today.

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49 minutes past the hour. welcome back. a new satellite image provided to cnn shows increased activity by worker at a launch pad in north korea. the activity shown in yesterday's photo was not seen in a satellite image taken only three days earlier. north korea says it intends to launch a rocket. it claims it's for science and he research purposes some time between december 10th and december 22nd. we're getting our first look at ashton kutcher as steve jobs.

resemblance from a young jobs right out of the garage is striking. it will premiere at the film festival in january. >> it really works. >> it does work. >> the average person today will process more data in a single day than a person did -- internet, computer and make it visual to show all the patterns within it and turn those patterns into some kind of an action, because you can really change lives. that is the press of a new premise called big data. "the human face of big data" ," new book, showing us how it's already giving us information. a day in the life book series. good morning. nice to have you with us. >> thanks for having me here. >> data is the new oil and you look for patterns.

explain to me why that is and how patterns have a value. >> my 10-year-old son has heard me on the phone saying big data. and he said what is it? >> imagine if you're looking through one eye and all of a sudden you can open up the second eye. yoor not only getting more information but a new dimension of understanding. all of our smart devices, atm passes, credit cards, browser histories, these are being overlapped and we're starting to see patterns we've never actually been able to perceive before. this is affecting health, transportation, entertainment. >> national security. let's start with the first picture. >> everything. >> this is a great shot that shows people going through the containers. we have a still of it. and the cpb, which i guess they're doing investigations -- they only check one out of 33 containers. >> if you actually think that osama bin laden is big in container shipping around the world. >> this book, by the way, weighs

562 pounds. >> paperback version. >> you write if they were to use smart technology it's less about what's in the container and more about where the container has been. >> and what's happened to it, who opened it, what temperature it's been in. what we're looking right now in 2012 is almost like where the internet was in 1992. we're watching a new world. it's being born. it's almost like we're watching the planet develop a nervous system. >> that, of course, could have implications to national security. >> yeah. >> we saw this in both campaigns, definitely the obama campaign, how it took all this data and information to figure out were you 60% or 70% likely to vote for a person, could they flip you and how they were targeting information based upon all this stuff. >> the people that you could actually influence and don't waste your time on the people that will never change their

mind or vote for you. >> phoenix synchronized swim team. it's a retirement community. they talk about a magic carpet. >> this is interesting. a lot of health -- we're spending 18% of our gdp on health care. our bills go up and our coverage goes down every month. one thing that intell and ge has been working on is a magic carpet you install in the home of your loved one. my mom is 90 and has fallen three times in the past year. putting in a carpet that measures how your mom walks on a good day. this is rick's mom when things are fine. >> amazing, right? >> when her balance is off, it can actually predict two days before it falls. this product is not out yet. i wear this, a jaw bone band. >> nichke fuel. >> instead of it being for ill people, three years before you're in an ambulance, your body has been giving off signals of something that's not right

but we've not been paying attention. >> i'm sorry, soledad. this concept of big data, your eye analogy is interesting. with all this information we just have the ability to understand not only each other and our behaviors, but ourselves at a deeper level. >> yes. >> what we want, our sexuality, everything at a deeper level? >> right. and right now everyone walking around with our smart phones are walking around with this constant data exhaust. a lot of people think of this as big brother. there's a company up in boston, for example, that can tell you two days before you get depressed. >> what? >> you have a -- >> i don't know that i want to know. >> i have to mention that the company that funded this is called emc. they give us complete freedom as a group of 200 journalists to look at this product. not that it will solve our problems but that this is a brand new world that's being born. it shouldn't just be companies and governments but individuals.

>> in two days, my husband is going to be really upset. >> "human face of big data." thank you for bringing this. >> appreciate it. still ahead this morning on "starting point," 27 days before we hit the fiscal cliff. some republicans are suggesting maybe we should just go over it. we'll talk about that and any prospects of a deal. republican congressman jeb henserling. if lawyers have to pass a bar, maybe a teacher has to pass a test before they're able to teach in a classroom. clients' . helping millions of americans retire on their terms. when they want. where they want. doing what they want. ameriprise. the strength of a leader in retirement planning. the heart of 10,000 advisors working with you one-to-one. together for your future.

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travelers. you won't take our future. aids affects us all. even babies. chevron is working to stop mother-to-child transmission. our employees and their families are part of the fight. and we're winning. at chevron nigeria, we haven't had a reported case in 12 years. aids is strong. aids is strong. but we are stronger. and aids... ♪ aids is going to lose. aids is going to lose. ♪ morning, welcome, everybody. our "starting point" this morning, no deal in sight. president obama wants to raise taxes on the wealthiest 2% of americans as speaker boehner

lashes out over his budget plan. hillary clinton is the lead candidate for 2016, a new poll shows. she keeps saying no, no, no. but will she heed the call? >> yes, yes, yes, yes, yes. new details on the murde murder/suicide involving kansas city chief jovan belcher. what the 911 calls reveal about the slaying of his girlfriend. what you should absolutely stay away from. packed show for you this morning. jeb henserling is joining us. american federation of teachers and our guest as well is randi weingarten. "starting point" begins right now. morning. welcome, everybody. our "starting point" this morning, president obama says he

will not bend in this fiscal cliff debate. americans face the prospect of severe tax hikes, spending cuts if republicans and democrats can't get together to work out some deal. congress breaks for the holidays in ten days. if they don't extend that, it will be ten days from then that we fall off the fiscal cliff. >> if we're going to be serious about reducing our deficit while still being able to invest in things like education and research and development that are important to our growth and if we're going to protect middle class families, then we're going to have to have higher rates for the wealthiest americans, folks like me. >> white house correspondent dan loa lothian is in washington, d.c. this morning. so who has the ball? and whose court is it in at this point? >> reporter: first of all, we know that house gop had that counter offer, which white house spokesman jay carney has referred to as, quote, magic

beans and fairy dust. we expect for republicans to put pressure on the white house to engage. in addition to that, to lock for whatever ways the white house might be able to look for cuts to entitlements. i think what's difficult now is to figure out exactly where the negotiations stand because from the white house perspective, they're saying that conversations continue, but there are house republican aids who are telling me that there are no phone conversations, no e-mails being exchanged. so it's difficult to tell how they can really move this ball forward if the two sides are not talking. in addition to that, republicans are having some problems because they're not on the same page. there is that, of course, counter offer from house speaker john boehner. there are some conservatives in the party who are pushing back. they think that $800 billion in new tax revenue will only hurt the economy, will put downward pressure on job creation and they don't think that it's a good idea. take a listen.

>> republicans should not be conceding that the federal government needs more money, negotiating with ourselves and treating the president's proposal like it's serious. >> i support the speaker. we're actually not very far apart on anything. at the end of the day he will negotiate a deal. there is an area we do agree with the president on. that's 98% of the american people getting about 80% of this tax cut shouldn't have their taxes raised. my suggestion is let's take the one area we agree and take it off the table. >> later this morning, the president will be speaking and taking questions at the business round table meeting. white house official saying that the president will make the case that middle class taxpayers out there want to see some kind of stability. they want to know that their taxes will not be going up at the end of the year. the president will also talk about how this fiscal cliff will have a negative impact on the economy and push these business leaders to support his approach. soledad? >> dan lothian for us this

morning. thank you, dan. we want to chat about this shall -- issue a little more. roland martin, and will cain join us. where the k. comes from. >> named off a frieof my parent. not a good story. i'll make one up. >> let's go back to this fiscal cliff. since taxes, will contaain, no matter what. if you do nothing, we fall off the cliff. taxes go up. you heard a proposal right there which is work on the middle class, avoid the fiscal cliff and renegotiate the taxes thing past 2013. why is that not a viable proposal? wouldn't that bring an end to the fiscal cliff? we could wrap it up now and everybody could go on vacation? >> yes, but you're asking the wrong guy. i'm not in congress. >> but you're on set, will.

come on, suck it up! >> i'm going to answer. i'm always happy to talk if you're going to put the camera on me. i can see reality in front of me and see that republicans have very little leverage to decide or impose their will on this outcome. that being said, what they're looking at is how can we kind of salvage a political victory out of this and stand for what we want? as you've had people on this program suggest, it may just be going over the fiscal cliff and not voting for a tax raise and then later negotiating taxes down. >> republicans will be blamed, polls show, if we go over the cliff. >> let's turn to jeb henserling, newly named chairman of the house committee and co-chair on the super committee. we heard will saying how do you salvage a political victory? the reality is if nothing is done, if you cannot get together, you go over the fiscal cliff and taxes go up for

everybody, correct? >> well, the president is going to get his revenue one way or the other. house republicans will do everything we can to minimize the damage to our economy. we know that by raising the rates on the top two brackets, as the president wants to do will cause middle income workers at least 2% off their paychecks, lose another 700,000 jobs. that's not something republicans are going to be part of. but the president obviously will get some rv new. there's nothing we can do to stop thachl it's written into current law. bottom line is that you can't solve this problem through revenue. and the president is not being serious. he is moving the goal post. he started out saying he wanted a, quote, unquote, balanced approach. the president will get some kind of revenue. i'm not voting for it, but he's going to get it anyway. the question is where are his spending deductions? >> you could avoid going off -- if we know, no matter what, taxes are going to go up. at this point they could go off the cliff for everybody. what you could do, as i think

owe olympia snow was recommending, you could do a deal that doesn't let the taxes go up for the middle class and avoid the fiscal cliff. >> first, the fiscal cliff, relative to our nation's spending driven debt crisis is a pothole. you've got 0.3% of all americans that have million dollar incomes. this is a shell game. you can't tax your way out of this problem. i mean, you have revenues that are about the same levels they were five or six years ago, when deficits were running $100, $150 billion. now we know deficits are running $1 to $1.5 trillion. what's changed is on the spending side yet all this discussion is on the tax revenues. you can tax every millionaire 100% and run the government for two or three months. this is a spending driven crisis and it has to be solved on the spending side. until the president gets serious about it, i'm not sure what there is to talk about, soledad. >> i'm not sure that the only

conversations have just been on the tax side. i actually think there have been conversations on both. at this moment, right, we're going over or toward the fiscal cliff. if you do nothing, all of our taxes are going up. why not, as a first move, say, listen, nobody at this point wants to raise taxes on the middle class and people who are lower income. so let's do some kind of a deal now and that will keep us from going over the fiscal cliff. then let the tax cuts expire for the wealthy january 1st. it happens. then you can do some kind of negotiation. and that keeps us from going over the fiscal cliff. it's going to happen anyway, right? >> this is the very kind of shell game they run in washington. if you'll just give me my tax increases today, i surely will give you your spending restraint tomorrow. >> but you have no leverage in the debate. >> we never see these spending reductions materialize. that's the problem. we're borrowing roughly 40 cents on the dollar, much of it from

the chinese, sending the bill to our children and grandchildren. that's unwise and unsustainable. frankly, i think it's immoral. and what you're saying is that republicans ought to agree, and somehow vote for a big proposed tax increase in hopes that in decade decades to come that this president will do something about spending. >> no, i didn't say that. what i said was why not -- why don't republicans and democrats vote for a tax -- to keep the taxes lower for middle class and people at lower income and let the other ones expire? you could do that now. and we wouldn't go over the fiscal cliff. >> what the speaker has done -- >> yeah, go ahead. >> what the speaker has done is exactly what the president claimed he he wanted. the speaker has put on the table a balanced approach. the president previously said -- >> but it didn't include tax cut. >> i want to raise the top two rates for $800 billion worth of revenue and a balanced approach with roughly $3 of spending reduction for every one dollar

of tax revenue. now he has $5 of tax increase for every $1 supposed spending reduction and doubled the size -- >> you can't be surprised -- >> the tax revenue. >> you can't be surprised that the president said no go to that, right? because it did not increase taxes on the wealthiest of americans, which he has consistently said. >> the president won 51-49. he has an electoral college victory. it's good enough to get him re-elected but not enough to give him a mandate. the american people voted for a divided government. and demands of house republican is equal to that of the president of the united states. we're not going to go out and put 700,000 americans on the unemployment lines. we're not going to take away wages from hard-working americans, which is exactly what the president wants to do. the president ought to remain good to his previous commitment and that is he wanted a balanced approach. republicans are willing to

negotiate in good faith. i think it's pretty obvious, particularly when the speaker puts on a plan put forth by erski nechlt bowles, a democrat in the first place. >> who has backed away from that. >> one who was appointed -- one who was appointed -- well, get mr. bowles on. he was in front of the super committee. i saw him eye to eye when he put this proposal on the table. >> as you know yesterday he said the circumstances have changed. >> i know he was right in front of me as co-chairman of the super committee and he put it on the table. if he wants to take it off the table, so be it. the fact of the matter is go and review the transcript and the tape. this was an erskine bowles proposal. he may want to put it up for adoption, i don't know. >> let me clarify for a moment. he is not claim iing he never presented it to you. what he's claiming is that circumstances now have changed is what he says in his statement that he has now released. >> the circumstance that is have changed is that under president obama we have our fourth

trillion dollar deficit and it is spending driven. until the president puts any kind of spending reductions on the table, all this talk of tax increases, you can give the president every job and tax increase he is asking for. ultimately middle income americans will get sockd with a tax increase beyond recognition unless we do something on the spending side. there's just so long you can play this shell game of trying to hide the true cost to government to middle income americans. they're going to get socked with it again. it's 0.3% americans have million dollar incomes. the problem with the president's plan is sooner or later you run out of millionaires. the math doesn't work. >> congressman jeb henserling. >> the only way we can get there is to save the next generation from bankruptcy. >> nice talking with you. >> i could have given you a 15-second flew. i'm not going to raise taxes. that is basically -- he is not

going to raise taxes. >> taxes are going up january 1st. >> 40% of the $787 billion stimulus bill he calls spending, 40% was tax cuts. does he disagree with those tax cuts? >> the political reality he is not willing to acknowledge is that the reason republicans won't kt a deal is because that's the only small amount of leverage they have now to hopefully keep tax rates down on the wealthiest americans now. if they cut tacks now on middle class and strike that deal they're never going to be able to get lower tax cuts. >> or get the spending cuts they want. >> entitlement reform as well. >> he brought up the bowles proposal. not only is he fighting with the left in the daytime, he is also fighting with the right during the night. is he getting attacked, jeb and the republican loweredship, including boehner, from the right. they removed three conservative/tea party congressmen from their committees. there's a fight from all angles. >> a war at the gop. >> it's closer to 53-47, just a

fact check. >> zoraida sambolin has our headlines. a man shoved off a platform, trying to climb back up before being hit and killed by a train. the photographer says that he was too far away to help and just kept shooting his camera. the hospital where katherine, the duchess of cambridge is staying, is now review i reviewing its procedures. why, you ask? after admitting it fell for a prank call. two australian djs were able to get an update on her condition. they claimed to be the queen and prince philip. the duchess is claiming to fe feeling better. she recovers from what the

palace says is extreme morning sickness. the palace says they are extremely grateful for the well wishes they have received. >> excuse me, this is the queen. how is kate doing? she's doing fine. >> i have more for you. >> not that convincing. >> i have more for you. we have good news for hillary clinton. if she decides to run for president in 2016, 57% of those polled by abc news and the washington post said they would support clinton. 37% said they would not support her candidacy. in addition -- in addition, the poll shows an overwhelming majority of women surveyed 66% would back her. only 47% of men would, roland. >> she wants some rest. she's been traveling four years. give her two years. my god! >> you just never know. >> she wants to rest for two

years. my goodness. >> when she's done with the nap or whatever, the vacation or the spa -- >> can we get to the inauguration before we go to the '16? >> i vote for that. doctors and lawyers have to take tests before they can start practicing. what about people who educate our kids? we'll talk to aft, american federation of teachers president, randi weingarten, for teachers to take bar-like exams. and select generic hypertension drugs available for only a penny... so you can focus on what really matters. call humana at 1-800-808-4003. so you can focus on what really matters. one is for a clean, wedomestic energy future that puts us in control. our abundant natural gas is already saving us money, producing cleaner electricity, putting us to work here in america and supporting wind and solar. though all energy development comes with some risk, we're committed to safely and responsibly producing natural gas.

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you need to pass a bar exam to be a lawyer, take a medical exam to be a drchlt what about teachers? new report released by the american federation of teachers is suggesting just that, that they should have to pass their own equivalent to a bar exam before they step into a classroom. randi weingarten, president of the american federation of teacher, you are behind this idea.

and that they ought to be more sclekive of the students they are taking into the teacher programs. why do you think this will make a difference? >> so when you think about how important teaching is, teachers come into teaching caring a lot about what they are going to do in the lives of students. care something not the issue. when you look at the countries that out compete us, they spend a lot of time preparing teachers. in fact, finland prepares teachers like we prepare doctors. as opposed to thinking that we can all just get it done on the job and have on the job training, experience matters a lot. you need to have a body of knowledge and some clinical experience to do what we consider the most important job in america, which is training a new generation. >> you're creating these three recommendations. all parties would agree on the standards. all parties would take the same assessment for the teachers and the standards would be governed by the educators. >> right. >> why the last one? why the educators overseeing it

as opposed to somebody else? >> right. because right now -- look, right now, unfortunately, there is too much of a testing fixation in the united states. and there's too much controlled in education by testing companies and by testing as opposed to what the profession thinks is important. medicine is controlled by the profession. law is controlled by the profession. engineering is controlled by the profession. there's a body of knowledge that we know. so, for example, it is ridiculous, ludicrous for anybody to think that i, as a social studies teacher, could teach physics. i would fail miserably in my classroom if i was teaching physics. that's part of the reason why you have a content gate before you start teaching. but it's also ridiculous to think that you can actually manage a classroom of 30 kids, differentiate instruction if you don't have some baseline clinical practice. and that's what professionals actually know. so we're saying, let's control

our own profession, just like lawyers and doctors. let's have high standards that are aligned with this new common core so we're aiming to help kids critically think, work together, apply knowledge. and let have this kind of universal assessment. teachers take a lot of tests already to become teachers. have a universal assessment so that teachers feel confident and competent on the first day of teaching. >> randi weingarten is the pre of the american federation of teachers. thanks for joining us. >> great to be with you. a list of what you should buy, coming up next. [ male announcer ] it's that time of year again.

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welcome back to "starting point." i'm christine romans. new this morning, 118,000 jobs were added according to adp. he quantified the numbers by superstorm sandy. quote, superstorm sandy wreaked havoc on the job market in november, slicing an estimated 86,000 jobs from payrolls. a quick market check right now, u.s. stock futures are still higher. fiscal cliff uncertainty is expected to weigh on stocks until that's resolved. we are 27 days until the fiscal cliff but there are only 27 days left until christmas. before you part with your hard-earned money, some advice for smart is the new rich. some of the best things to buy in december, toys. but only if you wait until two weeks before christmas. tools and hardware. this is the time to buy school driver sets, lawn care tools,

cooking and kitchenware. c cutl cutlery. things to stay away from, jewelry. you won't find low prices before gems and jewels before christmas. if you're going to propose wait until well after valentine's y day. electronics. best to wait until january or february. it's all about the bottom line, roland. newer models launched in later february, january. that's when you want to look at those and get the markdowns of the 2012 level. >> do you know how many women you just ticked off? hey, guys, wait till way past valentine's day. >> you want a guy who knows how to pinch his pennies. >> i've never seen a woman who says darling, thank you for being so frugal. >> i find that romantic. >> after he gives you the big ring. new this morning on "starting point," hillary clinton talking about the crisis

in syria and fear that is they will use chemical weapons. what she's saying now about the red line. we'll talk about that. imagine that a tree falls on your car. that tree and that little car. it happen to a couple in organize who survived without much physical damage. americans are always ready to work hard for a better future. since ameriprise financial was founded back in 1894, they've been committed to putting clients first. helping generations through tough times. good times. never taking a bailout. there when you need them. helping millions of americans over the centuries. the strength of a global financial leader. the heart of a one-to-one relationship. together for your future. ♪

welcome back, everybody. you're watching "starting point."

a tree flattens a couple's car. they're inside and able to walk away. i won't say without a scratch but they're not harmed too badly. they will talk to us about how they were able to survive that. first, to zoraida sambolin. >> i'm glad you're talking to them. i'm really curious about that. secretary of state hillary clinton talking about the red line in syria and how to bring the civil war there to an end. >> desperate assad regime might turn to chemical weapons or might lose control of them to one of the many groups that are now operating within syria. and so as part of the absolute unity we all have on this issue, we all have sent an unmistakable message that this would cross a red line and those responsible

would be held to account. >> foreign ministers approved turkey's request for patriot mfls to defend its borders from violence spilling over from syria. jovan belcher's murder/suicide is being captured by 911 calls. belcher's mother made that call after she found his girlfriend, kasandra perkinses shot and barely breathing. >> where is she bleeding? >> i can't tell. in the back it look like. >> okay. we don't want -- go ahead. where is your son at? >> just get the ambulance here please. >> we're on the way. where is your son at? >> he left. >> he left? >> yes. >> they were arguing and he shot her? >> yes, they were arguing. >> what's your son's name? [ bleep ]. >> please just get the ambulance here. >> ma'am. >> i have to get the baby.

>> he drove to the stadium where he killed himself after thanking the coach and the general manager for all they had done with him. the parents of a girl with leukemia who took her out of the hospital say they did it to help her. they say the 11-year-old was receiving bad care that was threatening her life. the girl's arm had to be amputated because of an infection. the parents say they believe she was if he can'ted in the hospital. the hospital says she already had it. because of the infection, doctors inserted a catheter in her heart. authorities have said the girl could die if she does not return to the hospital. premenopausal breast cancer patients currently taking the hormone blocking drug tamoxifen may benefit for taking the drug twice as long as originally thought. estrogen fed breast cancer

patients take the tamoxifen for five years. now a new study has found those who took the drug for ten years, recurrence was significantly reduced. an older lady chats him up, has no idea who he is. check it out. >> this is the last show. >> and you're going by subway? >> yes. >> i'm proud of you. >> say your name again. >> jay. jay-z. >> oh, you're jay-z? i know about jay-z. >> he was on to his way to the last of eight performances, riding the subway. you know, christine says that is the best way to get there. it gets a little crowded. >> unless you have a driver. he has like 15 people with him. >> but it's still pretty cool,

though. >> it's awesome. >> she's going, hey, what's up? some pictures to show you from oregon. hundred-foot tall tree fell and crushed the roof of a car. inside was a couple. somehow they're able to survive. and escape with not too many injuries. chris nadelberg, in the driver's seat, had a fracture and his wife was in the passenger seat. the picks look absolutely horrible. chris, tell me what kind of damage you have. i know -- i saw pictures where your arm was in a sling. >> yeah. i just had a fractured shoulder joint and so just doing some at-home therapy. should be a pretty quick recovery. >> walk me through what happened. obviously, you were in the car and all of a sudden, did you hear a noise this sounded like oh, my god, this tree is about

to collapse on us? >> yeah. we had just pulled up and were parked, sitting in the car. and we heard -- it sounded like a tree blowing in the wind, but then we saw the tree in front of us to our left coming at us. and we hardly had time to react. >> what did you do? >> we just instinctively got down as low as we could. tamona got down on the floor, in the passenger compartment there. and i just leaned over the center console. the roof ended up on my back my chest was on the center console. >> walk me through. when the tree falls does it fall like we see in the movie, slowly and collapse and crushes everything? did it fall quickly? was there a moment when you suddenly said oh, my god, it's over and we're mostly okay? walk me through that. >> it kind of -- it felt pretty quickly. we kind of heard something. we saw something falling away from the car and it was part of the tree that fell the opposite direction. but then the majority of the

tree came towards us. and it came pretty quickly. so there really wasn't much time to react. and once it did fall, once we realized we were all okay, it was nice to be able to talk with chris and be able to talk to each other about not having any injuries and, you know, pull out my phone and call 911 and just go from there and figure out what the next steps were. >> what an incredible luxury, to be able to call from your own phone and call someone to come in and rescue you. were you crying? were you in hysterics? were you calm? >> i was remarkably calm. i surprised myself. i guess i was just kind of shocked by it all. tymona was upset but she was calm enough to call 911. and so after she got off the phone with them, it was a little more emotional. and we just consoled each other and said everything was going to be fine. i was moving. she was moving. paramedics were there within ten minutes. >> were they stunned when they

saw -- >> it all happened pretty quick. >> were they stunned when they saw the condition of the car and how mostly fine you were? every time i see that video it's just stunning. >> yeah. we were told later the paramedics were probably more nervous than we were when they pulled up and saw the scene. they were shocked that -- specifically that i was looiv alive because of the condition of the car. >> now you look back and i've heard you said you feel lucky, which sounds really strange. i guess luck that it wasn't somebody else in that spot, right? explain that to me. >> we feel really blessed. definitely someone was looking out for us. and we're very thankful for the opportunity to walk away from that. and, yeah, like you said, fortunate it wasn't anybody else or anybody else wasn't there also when the tree fell. >> it's great to be able to interview you. and not do it from a hospital bed or have anything more serious than that.

>> yeah. >> chris natelborg and tymona as well, thank you for talking with us. >> thank you for having us. it's a question many people call richly ambiguous are often asked what are you? as americans get past seeing color of skin. we'll talk about that straight ahead. you heard about the revolutionary war in history class. what were the news accounts of the war like when it was actually happening, from the boston tea party to the signing of the declaration of independence. we'll take a look at that, coming up next. then no one will want to steal the deliciousness. with a variety of tastes and textures only chex mix is a bag of interesting. plays a key role throughout our lives. one a day men's 50+ is a complete multivitamin designed for men's health concerns as we age. it has 7 antioxidants to support cell health.

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this coming weekend on sunday, on cnn, we will premiere my documentary, who is black in

america? among the people we're going to meet, two young women who are constantly asked the question, what are you? that's because they're racially ambiguous sbch ambiguous. how they describe and answer that question is the topic of our documentary. here is a preview. ♪ >> if i had a word to describe me, it would mostly be quirky. i'm in a band. we do like progressive alternative rock kind of. at first when people meet me they don't really know what i am. people will ask me, what are you? >> 17-year-old nayo jones is a singer, talented poet, a high school senior. but that's not what people want to know. >> recently after i had one of those experiences i sort of

started writing things and i was like, becca deals with the same thing. let's make this a group piece. what is it you want to do? >> i don't know. pick a poem. >> they do spoken word poetry together. >> it start off and it's like, girl, you are so pretty. what are you? the quintessential question for the tan skin girl with soft kinky curls and a frizz that doesn't seem to quit because answering human simply isn't enough for them. they can't handle my racially ambiguous figure. >> they itch to know just what i am. it helps them sleep at night if they can just pin down the reason for my poet burnt skin. >> historically put most people into one or two boxes, black or white. >> can you decide if you are black or white? >> i don't think anybody else gets to pick for me. when it comes down to it, it's what i say about myself that's

the most important. >> or is it, in fact? or is it what society says to them? >> huge issue. >> who is black in america premieres sunday december 9th at 8:00 pm. we replay it at 11:00 pm. i'll be online tweeting as well as the documentary is playing. >> you have no idea how major it is. >> drives people crazy. >> my aunt when she died her daughter would not tell my grandmother that her sister died because she did not want to show up at the funeral until two months later. >> lot of crazy stories around it. >> yes, and that was last year. moments before he was killed by a subway. now the photographer is speaking out. we'll tell you what he is saying. new book explores how those unfolding moments were covered. we're at walmart with the simmons family. how much is your current phone bill?

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welcome back to "starting point," new york post photographer who shot this picture. it shows a man pushed off the subway platform desperately trying to climb off the tracks before being struck and killed by that train. the photographer says he was in no position to save that man. >> if this thing happened again with the same circumstances, whether i had a camera or not and i was running towards it, there is no way i could have rescue rescued mr. han. >> he admits he has since sold that photograph. arresting a suspect who they say has implicated himself in

that crime. soledad? reporting the revolutionary war, americans now see a different side of the birth of our country as being reported real time by journalists of the day. personal collection of original newspaper prints from the late 1700s gives a fascinating account of americans who witnessed the war unfold firsthand, as it happened. the author is with us this morning. nice to have you with us. appreciate it. first of all, i know that we often look at historical accounts as an interpretation of history. you want it to go to your own account. why do it this way? >> for 200 plus years, historians have referenced these newspapers in footnotes of their own analysis and interpretations. >> right. >> for the first time ever i wanted to invert the traditional history book and provide full color access to the original newspapers that were the only mass media of the day.

>> these are your documents. where do you get them from? >> very much like american pickers, i traverse the earth looking for historic documents in rare book shops and with historic dealers and ebay. you name t these are very much available just like any other historical collectible. >> interesting. let's look at some of the examples from the book. here is the first-known quoting of taxation without representation. may 10th, 1764, five weeks after the british passes the sugar act, which we all know from our studies which is what kicked off this whole entire thing. our other advices by the packet are that a scheme of taxation of the american colonies has for some time been in agitation. that it had been previously dough baited in parliament, whether they had power to lay such a tax on colonies which had no representative in parliament. editorials at the time spurring people into action? >> stroemly important and extremely powerful in that these

are what fanned the flames of rebellion and sustained loyalty to the cause. historians are saying without newspapers there would have been no american revolution. >> could people read? what was the amount of the population reading newspaper? >> america was one of the most literate societies in the time, particularly the northern colonies and in new england. literacy rates were very high. >> it was always stunning to go back and literally read in real time back in 1906 and '07 and '08 and '09. as you were doing this, were you sitting here, getting the ebb and flow of the story and seeing how it was moving in so many ways? >> absolutely. it triggers your intense and passion for history that you didn't necessarily have before. i brought with me the article.

american revolution has begun. this is only one of two newspapers printed on american soil of about 40 at the time that print the news on its front page. and the only newspaper of those 40 to print it with a headline, bloody news. >> what was the other front page news of that day? >> not the kardashians. >> the other newspaper that printed it on the front page was the georgia gazette in savannah. but front page news was typically essays, foreign news, advertisements because pages two or & three were typeset later in the week. there you would normally find the latest news. >> talking about royal babies back then, right? >> let me read the salem news essex gazette. they were talking about the boston tea party. they applied themselves to the destruction of this commodity in earnest and in the pace of about two hours broke up 342 chests and discharged their contents into the sea.

a watch as i am informed was stationed to prevent embezzlement and not a single ounce of tea was suffered to be purloined by the populace. no one stole the tea. they just dumped it. >> you learn that somebody did try to pocket the tea and they were quickly seized and pummeled by the other colonists. >> their editorials make today's columns look like wimps. they used to write really tough editorials. >> this is where partisan propaganda was started. there were patriot and loyalist newspapers back then. that's where you really see the fires start. >> the book is called reporting, the revolutionary war before it was history, it was news. i love that. nice to have you with us. >> thanks for having me, soledad. >> pleasure. end point is up next. if you are one of the millions of men

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welcome back. end point now. yes, rolapped, why don't you start? >> no, no. i wanted to say something on randi weingarten. in a mind-set that says if i fail at anything in college, at least i can teach. it's amazing how we sayed kags is so important. so part of the deal is to change what happens in college. that's right. it shouldn't be the job of last resort. >> will cain? >> will cain? the issue with the photographer and the subway photo continues to burn on the internet here and i think you and i just had an interesting exchange. what is the job of the photographer, his primary responsibility? first to be a human being. whether or not he could have saved him, i would have liked to have seen him try. >> mckay coppen, better version of your first name? >> not yet. the fiscal cliff, the stuff to watch there is the tea party and